Gov. Rick Scott's former top attorney has quietly withdrawn his application for a seat on Florida's 1st District Court of Appeal, but only after two prominent liberal trial lawyers challenged his qualifications in emails to the Judicial Nominating Commission.
Charles Trippe, Scott's general counsel from 2011 to 2012, widely considered within the legal community as a shoe-in for the position, withdrew his candidacy on March 11, just days after the Governor foiled a similar smear campaign against Alan Forst, whom the governor appointed to the 4th District Court.
As you know, it is very important that the 1st District Court of Appeal recapture credibility after the embarrassment suffered due to some overly political appointments. ... I raise this point because Governor Scotts former General Counsel Mr. Trippe has applied and that sounds oh too much like a movie we have seen, Tallahassee trial lawyer Donald Hinkle wrote in an 8:44 a.m. email to JNC chair Mike Glazer on March 7. Mr. Trippe not only has no judicial experience (not even a judicial clerkship) but it appears he has little to no meaningful appellate experience as a lawyer. He has no business starting his judicial career at the appellant level.
Just three hours later, Hinkle's email was followed up with one authored by fellow Tallahassee trial lawyer John Mills, who forwarded to JNC member Daryl Parks remarks made by Trippe at a workshop hosted by the James Madison Institute, a limited-government think tank.
Worth a read to understand why you, my brother, are 'both a direct and indirect threat to our constitutional order,' Mills wrote, the you, my brother referring to Parks, who is also a Tallahassee trial attorney.
[Check out Trippe's application to the JNC and Hinkle and Mills' emails, all of which are attached to this article.]
In his 2001 remarks before the Institute, Trippe had opined that [w]hen lawyers organize themselves into a 'fourth branch of government,' they are posing both a direct and an indirect threat to the constitutional order, and accused some trial lawyers of wanting not to promote the common good but to accumulate power and wealth in the hands of the legal profession.
Judicial nominating commissions look to determine whether applicants display the ability not only to be impartial, but also to follow the law without imposing a personal agenda. The governor himself has emphasized this important quality as a core qualification, Mills told SSN when asked what motivated him to send the email. Mr. Trippes suggestion that the 'role of the judiciary' is to impose personal views like those espoused in the article is relevant to the question of whether he would exercise judicial restraint and follow the law, even if that meant that a plaintiffs trial lawyer might receive a significant fee as a result.
Both Hinkle and Mills have represented plaintiffs who've sued tobacco companies; Mills has even litigated against R.J. Reynolds, one of Trippe's current clients. (If appointed to the 1st DCA, judicial ethics would have required Trippe to recuse himself from proceedings involving former clients.)
Hinkle's criticisms of Trippe's lack of judicial experience (not even a judicial clerkship) is ironic, given that both Hinkle and Mills actively raised funds for the 2012 retention campaign of Florida Supreme Court Justices Barbara Pariente, Peggy Quince, and R. Fred Lewis. As SSN previously reported, neither of the three justices had any judicial experience before their appointment to an appeals court, and Lewis went to the Supreme Court straight from a career devoted exclusively to private practice.
And neither Quince nor Lewis ever served as judicial clerks.
As for Trippe, shortly after he started his tenure as one of the Sunshine State's highest-ranking government lawyers, the St. Petersburg Times devoted a full-length feature on his distinguished legal career, titling it Charles Trippe's Litigation Experience Serves Him Well as Gov. Rick Scott's Top Attorney.
That experience included his having graduated from Columbia Law School and been named a partner at Jones Day, one of the most prestigious law firms in the world; the firm's distinguished alumni include such eminent jurists as U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia and even he never attained partner status.
Sources tell SSN, on very deep background, that the humble Trippe, who shuns the public limelight, withdrew his candidacy after learning about the emails, not wanting him or his family to be subject to the same kind of smear campaign liberal legal activists habitually run against right-of-center judicial candidates like Alan Forst or former Supreme Court candidate Frank Jimenez.
It is unfortunate that a very experienced litigator, with over 30 years of experience on the defense side of the bar, including prior experience as a Jones Day partner, and the former general counsel for CSX [Transportation], would suffer a campaign against him by plaintiffs attorneys, urging that a professional life as a blue chip litigation attorney be ignored, because of his political service to Governor Scott, and that his experience does not qualify him to be an appellate judge, one practicing litigator tells SSN.
Trippe and Hinkle declined to comment for this story.
Reach Eric Giunta at egiunta@sunshinestatenews.com or at (954) 235-9116.
